Bay Area Television station KTVU Channel 2 reports on the remarkable story of how two deadly diseases, one extremely rare and one a global epidemic, are connected by a cholesterol metabolism gene called Niemann Pick Type C located on Chromosome 18.

Dr. James Hildreth, a pre-eminent HIV/AIDS researcher who heads the Center for AIDS Health Disparities Research at Meharry Medical College in Nashville discusses how a non toxic sugar compound called cyclodextrin kills HIV/AIDS. Cyclodextrin punches holes in the virus, inactivating its ability to replicate in the body.

When HIV enters the human body, it attaches itself to cholesterol. Dr. Hildreth has discovered how HIV creates itself in a person’s cells — by utilizing the Niemann Pick Type C proteins on Chromosome 18.

The story details how 5 year old identical twins, Addi and Cassi Hempel, who were born with a defect on the Niemann Pick Type C gene, will receive infusions of cyclodextrin into their bloodstreams to help treat their rare cholesterol disorder. Their treatment could pave the way for future HIV/AIDS therapies.